Polygon's Nailwal: NFTs in Gaming 'Bigger Than Hollywood' in the US

Polygon's co-founder sees non-fungible tokens (NFT) and gaming as the way people are drawn to the blockchain. The India-based Ethereum layer 2 company recently said it was leaning more into blockchain-based gaming and NFTs by launching a project called Polygon Studios.

Sandeep Nailwal, also Polygon's chief operations officer, said on CoinDesk TV’s "First Mover that “very few people understand that even in the U.S., [gaming] is bigger than Hollywood, [the National Basketball Association] and multiple other industries combined. Play-to-own and various other models that are coming in are going to disrupt the business models in the gaming industry.”

He added, “We all believe that NFT is the gateway to bring masses into the blockchain."

NFTs in gaming is one of the hotter blockchain trends of the summer. In Nailwal’s opinion, the vibrancy around gaming is thanks to play-to-own games such as Axie Infinity.

All this is happening at an interesting time for Polygon, one of the largest crypto projects to come out of India. The government of Pres. Nerendra Modi has made it clear it’s leery of digital assets. However, Nailwal said he has yet to come across a single project that faced government interference in India.

“They only interfere where there is retail buying and selling of crypto,” Nailwal said. Nonetheless, the company has taken steps to “decentralize” where it operates. “No one can predict the future, which is why Polygon has been one of the first projects that decentralized its location. Now, most of our workforce is in the U.S., Europe, parts of Southeast Asia.”